Charles Santini
Charles Santini is a man that has made some mistakes in his 32 years on this earth. His real name is Louis Cochrane but that man is wanted by a few prominent groups in the wasteland, some of which want him dead. Charles Santini is the alias Louis goes by and he tries not draw attention to himself. Despite the new name and determination to not get arrested Charles does slip back into old habits occasionally. The path to lawful behavior is a hard one for Charles to walk but out of necessity he has to try his best. This is a man that will do what it takes to live another day and right now that means blending in but should the situation change Charles will quickly adapt to the new paradigm. (we're referring to him by his current alias because this can get really confusing otherwise) History Charles was born 30 some years ago in the town of Santa Mira California. His family made their living scavenging scrap plastic for a novelties company called Platinum Shamrock. They would dig through trash heaps to find old grocery bags and bits of old toys. These would get melted down and made into various new products for the more affluent. The work was hard and the plastic cut your hands. this often led to nasty infections from digging around old garbage with open wounds. Charles did everything he could to escape his life as he grew older. He tried education but found no one wanted to hire him without previous job experience which he couldn't get without a job. He tried to get hired on by caravans but they didn't need another unskilled layman when the surrounding communities were full of people that would work harder for less. In the middle of this frustration, Charles found something that he probably shouldn't have in his state of mind. Under a pile of ancient newspapers that dated back centuries to the prewar era was an old oriental rug. Charles thought that this would make an excellent addition to his shed but he found that there was something inside of it when he pulled it out. The rug had a skeleton inside of it in military clothing. The rug served as a crude coffin and inside the skeleton had on Chinese fatigues and a few treasured items. The burial must have been done by other Chinese insurgents given the care put into the disposal. All of this was a gold mine and Charles carried the rug back to his shed minus the bones. With a healthy amount of patchwork, the military clothes fit Charles and the Chinese dress uniform's overcoat made a nice duster to keep out the elements. You probably wouldn't recognize the uniform given all the other fabrics in it but they were the best clothes Charles had ever had after wearing rags most of his life. There was one other item though that Charles had avoided so far but it had to be addressed, the Chinese laser rifle. It was in bad shape but the gun could take a serious beating and still shoot. Using a bit of shoestring Charles unclogged the barrel and found the gun still worked. In most people's hands, the story would end here but Charles was tired, tired of being a plastic scrapper, tired of other people getting rich of him, tired of his life going nowhere. He took a drastic action and turned to armed robbery. The town only had one store and with all the trade wagons hitched next to it, it was the perfect crime. Once Charles stepped inside the shop things went south fast. He didn't count on people shooting back and a quick robbery turned into a bloodbath as people shot anything that moved in the confusion. With the job badly botched Charles grabbed a quick handful of micro fusion cells and hoped whatever wagon he stole would have some valuable stuff in it. He took a wagon with a couple of healthy looking Brahmin and made his escape. Charles didn't have a specific destination in mind he just kept heading northeast until he was far away from anyone who would recognize him. After a couple weeks worth of riding, he came upon a camp of slavers somewhere around Utah. The slavers helped themselves to the food in the back of the wagon and in-exchange Charles got to work for them. Charles found that he took to the job pretty well, which was for the best because he didn't have a choice. The slavers gave him a cattle prod to keep their inventory well behaved. Eventually, they trusted Charles to help them harvest local settlements. Eventually, the locals had enough of the slavers and organized a group of lawmen to put the slavers out of business. Charles fled the first chance he got and ran as hard as he could to the south with most of the others. The lawmen chased them for days and there were a series of ambushes and showdowns between the fleeing slavers and the deputies. There usually ended in the favor of the deputies but the slavers had a few tricks of their own. Charles didn't stick around to see who won, he fled in the opposite direction during a bad shootout and just kept running until the rest of the group was a distant speck on the horizon. He eventually ran into a caravan that gave him a ride to their main hub in Fort Tecate, New Mexico. In New Mexico, Charles tried to start again and lead a normal life. As one of the few literate individuals in town, the locals made him a school teacher. As a teacher, Charles found peace and was able to put aside his demons. He went by the name Aaron Flint to cover up his past and he quickly became a pillar of the community. A few years later a group of abolitionist bounty hunters arrived at the fort. They were seeking to hire a caravan to give them a ride out into Texas after some rumored slave gangs. It was just rotten luck on Charles's part that these bounty hunters were former slaves. One of the bounty hunters recognized Charles from their time in Utah and they formed a plan to kill him. The bounty hunters couldn't kill Charles in town limits without getting shot or hurting a child. Instead, they kidnapped him at night and rode quickly away into Texas, safely away from anyone that would stop them. The abolitionists took too long to kill Charles though, they let their guard down and our hero was able to reach his cattle prod. He used a jagged edge on the metal to cut his ropes and then he electrocuted the bounty hunters. At that close range, his melee weapon was more effective than their holstered guns. Charles hijacked the wagon and tied up the bounty hunters. Instead of taking them with him, though, Charles just left them for dead in the desert. After a few days, Charles ditched the wagon and took a new alias for himself, Charles Santini. In Texas, Charles turned back to his life of crime briefly as the bounty hunters had left him with very little beyond his clothes and weapons. After a few jobs he became a bit too famous around El Paso, so Charles headed east a bit until things cool off. He's currently laying low around the Midessa region doing odd jobs and riding with the caravans. Character Stats and Such: Appearance He's about average height and is pretty lean from all the running he has to do on a regular basis. His hairline is receding, and he wears thick-framed glasses on his somewhat round face. He's fond of wearing prewar Chinese military garb, but he has trouble finding uniforms so most what he wears is heavily worn and patched with regular clothing. Strengths and Weaknesses Charles isn't too bad a shot with his energy rifle and he can swing that cattle prod pretty hard. He's better educated then most wasteland dwellers and can also talk his way out of situation about 40% of the time. He does have a little barter skill after spending so much time around caravans. On the downside, he does tend to be self-interested in times when the group is in trouble. This might seem to conflict with his desire for redemption but that's just a lie Charles tells himself. He's not interested in making the sacrifices he would need to make for redemption and his goal is just self-delusion. Skill-wise he's not too good with Big guns or small guns. Don't look for this guy to be a doctor in your group or fix stuff either. Weapons and Inventory Chinese Laser Rifle - This battered old gun is Charles's go-to weapon for most fights. In peak condition a trained marksmen could be effective within 500 yards. This gun and Charles aren't any of these things so about 150 yards or so is the maximum range. The weapon fires charges of hot plasma in three round bursts, full auto or semi auto. Right now the gun is stuck in semi auto but it has a clip size of 25 microfusion cells which isn't too shabby. This gun barrows heavily from it's assault rifle counterpart and has about 8 pieces total so maintenance is a breeze. The gun uses traditional iron sights to aim. Cattle Prod - Not much to this one it's your typical cattle prod. It shocks people when it touches them and you can knock somebody pretty hard in the head with it. Inventory - Armory Script, bottle of bourbon Category:Characters Category:Slavers